An Unusual Case of Extra-Enteric Blastocystosis in the Uterine Cervix

Overview

Journal Korean J Parasitol

Specialty Parasitology

Date 2020 Nov 17

PMID 33202510

Citations 1

Authors

Yolanda Escutia-Guzman

Williams Arony Martinez-Flores

Joel Martinez-Ocana

Ramon Martinez-Pimentel

Marisol Benitez-Ramirez

Fernando Martinez-Hernandez

Sara Arroyo-Escalante

Mirza Romero-Valdovinos

Guadalupe Erendira Orozco-Mosqueda

Pablo Maravilla

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Extra-enteric infections by Blastocystis spp. have rarely been documented. Here, we report a case of extra-enteric blastocystosis in a patient with minimal cervicitis symptoms. A 47-year-old Hispanic female patient was attended in a primary health centre in Michoacan state, Mexico, for her routine gynaecological medical examination. As only symptom, she referred to a slight vaginal itching. The presence of several vacuolar-stages of Blastocystis spp. were identified by Papanicolaou staining; molecular identification was attempted by culture-PCR sequencing of a region of 18S gene from cervical and faecal samples obtained 2 months after cytological examination, even when patient declared that she tried self-medicating with vaginal ovules. Blastocystis ST1 was identified only in the faecal sample. The presence of Blastocystis spp. in the cervix of a patient with scarce symptomatology, demonstrates the extraordinary flexibility of this microorganism to adapt to new environments and niches.

Citing Articles

Unexpected Presence of Blastocystis Subtype 1-3 DNA in Human Vaginal and Sperm Samples Coinfected with Trichomonas vaginalis.

Villalobos G, Sanchez-Aguillon F, Carmona-Maldonado M, Gonzalez-Arenas N, Lopez-Escamilla E, Hernandez-Castro R Korean J Parasitol. 2022; 60(3):195-200.

PMID: 35772738 PMC: 9256282. DOI: 10.3347/kjp.2022.60.3.195.

References

Scanlan P . Blastocystis: past pitfalls and future perspectives. Trends Parasitol. 2012; 28(8):327-34. DOI: 10.1016/j.pt.2012.05.001. View

Ramirez J, Sanchez A, Hernandez C, Florez C, Bernal M, Giraldo J . Geographic distribution of human Blastocystis subtypes in South America. Infect Genet Evol. 2016; 41:32-35. DOI: 10.1016/j.meegid.2016.03.017. View

Calore E, Calore N, Cavaliere M . Salpingitis due to Entamoeba histolytica. Braz J Infect Dis. 2002; 6(2):97-9. DOI: 10.1590/s1413-86702002000200007. View

Yoshikawa H, Wu Z, Nagano I, Takahashi Y . Molecular comparative studies among Blastocystis isolates obtained from humans and animals. J Parasitol. 2003; 89(3):585-94. DOI: 10.1645/0022-3395(2003)089[0585:MCSABI]2.0.CO;2. View

Santos H, Sodre F, de Macedo H . Blastocystis sp. in splenic cysts: causative agent or accidental association? A unique case report. Parasit Vectors. 2014; 7:207. PMC: 4026114. DOI: 10.1186/1756-3305-7-207. View

Turkeltaub J, McCarty 3rd T, Hotez P . The intestinal protozoa: emerging impact on global health and development. Curr Opin Gastroenterol. 2014; 31(1):38-44. DOI: 10.1097/MOG.0000000000000135. View

Santin M, Gomez-Munoz M, Solano-Aguilar G, Fayer R . Development of a new PCR protocol to detect and subtype Blastocystis spp. from humans and animals. Parasitol Res. 2011; 109(1):205-12. DOI: 10.1007/s00436-010-2244-9. View

Tan K . New insights on classification, identification, and clinical relevance of Blastocystis spp. Clin Microbiol Rev. 2008; 21(4):639-65. PMC: 2570156. DOI: 10.1128/CMR.00022-08. View

Og A, Oe O, To A . Sensitivity of a papanicolaou smear in the diagnosis of candida albicans infection of the cervix. N Am J Med Sci. 2012; 2(2):97-9. PMC: 3354441. DOI: 10.4297/najms.2010.297. View

10.

Edgar R . MUSCLE: multiple sequence alignment with high accuracy and high throughput. Nucleic Acids Res. 2004; 32(5):1792-7. PMC: 390337. DOI: 10.1093/nar/gkh340. View

11.

Hu K, Lin C, Wang T, Liu C, Chen M, Chang W . Amoebic liver abscess or is it?. Gut. 2008; 57(5):627, 683. DOI: 10.1136/gut.2006.119149. View

12.

Kumar S, Stecher G, Li M, Knyaz C, Tamura K . MEGA X: Molecular Evolutionary Genetics Analysis across Computing Platforms. Mol Biol Evol. 2018; 35(6):1547-1549. PMC: 5967553. DOI: 10.1093/molbev/msy096. View

13.

Prodeus T, Zelia O, Khlebnikova T, Pikul D . [Extraenteric infection caused by Blastocystis spp. in a female patient with liver abscess]. Med Parazitol (Mosk). 2014; (2):6-9. View

14.

Feine I, Shpitzen M, Geller B, Salmon E, Peleg T, Roth J . Acetone facilitated DNA sampling from electrical tapes improves DNA recovery and enables latent fingerprints development. Forensic Sci Int. 2017; 276:107-110. DOI: 10.1016/j.forsciint.2017.04.023. View

15.

Sepp R, Szabo I, Uda H, Sakamoto H . Rapid techniques for DNA extraction from routinely processed archival tissue for use in PCR. J Clin Pathol. 1994; 47(4):318-23. PMC: 501934. DOI: 10.1136/jcp.47.4.318. View

16.

Kumar K, Askari F, Sahu M, Kaur R . : A Lot More Than Meets the Eye. Microorganisms. 2019; 7(2). PMC: 6407134. DOI: 10.3390/microorganisms7020039. View

17.

Villegas-Gomez I, Martinez-Hernandez F, Urrea-Quezada A, Gonzalez-Diaz M, Durazo M, Hernandez J . Comparison of the genetic variability of Blastocystis subtypes between human carriers from two contrasting climatic regions of México. Infect Genet Evol. 2016; 44:334-340. DOI: 10.1016/j.meegid.2016.07.036. View

18.

Villalobos G, Orozco-Mosqueda G, Lopez-Perez M, Lopez-Escamilla E, Cordoba-Aguilar A, Rangel-Gamboa L . Suitability of internal transcribed spacers (ITS) as markers for the population genetic structure of Blastocystis spp. Parasit Vectors. 2014; 7:461. PMC: 4203911. DOI: 10.1186/s13071-014-0461-2. View

19.

Jimenez-Gonzalez D, Martinez-Flores W, Reyes-Gordillo J, Ramirez-Miranda M, Arroyo-Escalante S, Romero-Valdovinos M . Blastocystis infection is associated with irritable bowel syndrome in a Mexican patient population. Parasitol Res. 2011; 110(3):1269-75. DOI: 10.1007/s00436-011-2626-7. View

20.

WOLYNSKA M, Soroczan W . [Blastocystis hominis Brumpt, 1912, (Phycomycetes) in the female genital tract]. Pol Tyg Lek. 1972; 27(21):788-91. View